Sunday, May 20, 2012

Please give a warm welcome to Rodney Ross

I don't have guests often, but I'm pleased to present Rodney Ross, whose new novel, "The Cool Part of His Pillow" recently released from Dreamspinner Press. If you've read my work you know I love angst, and happy endings (but the main character has to work for it.)

I've read the blurb and can't help wondering: is ‘The
Cool Part Of His Pillow’ (TCPohP) a romance or a journey to
recovery? What kind of experience can
readers expect?

I
would say both. Barry Grooms is a success by any measure: expansive interior
design gallery, 20-plus years of stability with partner Andy, financial
security, he still has all of his own hair and teeth. Then everything changes
when, on Barry’s 45th birthday, a horrendous construction crane
collapse kills Andy and their two pugs.

His
plunge into widowerhood is surreal – casseroles of sympathy, being offered
someone else’s snotrag, a parasitic grief support group – yet Barry is damaged, not destroyed, and as
he slowly rebuilds a world largely destroyed, my hope is anyone who has
experienced loss, felt backed into a corner, dealt with
know-it-all-but-well-meaning-friends-and-relatives or retreated into denial,
will find resonance.

TCPohP is also funny, full of
wicked observation. Not rimshot jokes nor Neil Simon-ish set-ups…more humor
that naturally emerges from situations…misery is so much more fun when
sprinkled with the macabre or the politically-incorrect, the scatological or
the blasphemous. Barry’s smartassedness, his skeptical eye rolls, are what
ultimately save him.

I notice you have a book trailer. Tell us some of your thoughts on book
trailers. Do they make an effective
marketing tool?

Actually,
I have several TCPohP trailers; by going to YouTube at by going to YouTube at http://youtu.be/p2hbNenYe4g, you can watch
one, then access the rest, some teasers, others time-sensitive, a couple more
general. Having come from -- or, rather, escaped -- the Advertising arena and
its bloodlust, I know too well how society is visually-driven. And don’t we all
love a good Coming Attraction at the local multiplex (after the 22 goddamn
commercials for soft drinks and one-night-only opera telecasts we’ll never
attend?) A carefully-crafted trailer can give the potential reader a hint of
what’s to come, without spoilers or too much hyperbole. My endgame was to
attract interest.

I absolutely adore the cover art. Who
designed the cover and what do you like best about it?

Anne Cain, who does a lot of work
for DSP. Beyond the literal emptiness of the bed, a pillow clearly not slept
upon and a forlorn hand, I like the detachment…almost seen through parchment,
from an impassive distance. I like how the wrinkled sheets trail down and
recede into marbelization. The colors aren’t quite real. Nor is the character’s
life after being thrust into the darkest recesses he could ever imagine.

What
has been the toughest criticism given to you as an author? What has been the best compliment?

The worst: being informed by a
literary agent probably no older than my tweezers that my writing was “too
jazzy” for her palate. I protested, “But I hate jazz!” I still don’t know what
that means, but I do my best now to avoid mentioning saxophones and Ann Hampton
Calloway as I wordsmith. What a load of horseshit. You may as well tell me you
don’t like the way I type, it’s that impenetrable.

The best: a Key West, FL neighbor
who was once a columnist for the Chicago
Tribune telling me, upon reading the raw
manuscript-- before I ever submitted it anywhere -- that TCPohP gave her an asthma attack. My new
goal is to always make someone reach for an inhaler.

What
aspect of your own life has most influenced your writing or storytelling?

Being a gay male, certainly, and
permit to be demure and evasive as I add one of a certain age, I wanted to voice something relevant to a certain demographic:
loneliness borne of loss, not of abandonment or cheating or even illness, but
unthinkable circumstance. I am remarkably fortunate to be with a man who has
tolerated and treasured me for a very long time. If our relationship was
measured in dog years, it would be something out of JurassicPark.
Having known this bliss, I wanted to talk about the absence of love after
having had it…when AARP is about the only thing that may come courting. Love is
visceral and tactile, as well as emotional, and its absence can cause as much
physical as emotional distress. And I ain’t talking blue balls.

What
part of the writing process do you enjoy the most? The least?

The challenge is always sitting
down and writing, while also being depressingly aware that the final polish is
so, so distant. Writing is so damned isolated, and isolating. A writer looks
for distraction: the shit-laden litterpan to scoop, or sit-ups to attempt, a
martini that’s just yelling to be shaken. I always have a notepad and pen, or a
mini-cassette recorder, handy. I treat my muse like a sneeze: I gotta catch the
spray when I can!

That said, I cherish the ability
to create and manipulate lives in the way we, of course, cannot make ours so
malleable. The inclination to write is so embedded, I cannot imagine NOT
writing. I was a creative child, self-isolating and brooding. Most is nature….a
bit is nurture…all of it is heavy lifting.

I'm a seat-of-the-pants writer, working on twelve stories at once. Do you work on one project at
a time? Or do you multi-task?

One
at a time. Having come -– or, rather, escaped, from the arena of Advertising –-
I multitask quite capably, but that doesn’t guarantee a satisfying result. I
wish I could divide my brain like the segments of an orange and each juicy
membrane would address a different novel, screenplay or play, but I have to
bring my whole fruitness to a single game.

What song would best describe your life?

Anything from Karen
Carpenter. As a younger gay, I
instinctively understood the forlorn quality of her voice; now, as an Eldergay,
I appreciate even more her. When pressed, I would say her rendition of
‘Superstar’ would accompany me to a deserted island, along with guacamole,Grey
Goose and a glycolic facial wash.

Personally, I find techno without words helps drive creativity. Do you
listen to music when writing? Do you feel like some stories write themselves a
soundtrack with specific music? If so, what book and what kind of music
influenced it?

I
prefer silence when I write in my office: no music, no TV in the other room,
even ambient noise outdoors can be distracting. Occasionally, when traveling,
I’ll listen to my iPod and scribble some notes and, inevitably, it’s usually
sparked by a film soundtrack. The compositions of Rachel Portman are especially
inspirational.

Now that you’re published, describe the
journey.

Well, I’m still on it. I cannot
begin to predict the turns, the fast stops, the backing-up I will have to do to
push my novel in conjunction with Dreamspinner Press (DSP).

Writing letters of inquiry and
sending novel samples – “send us your best chapter,” some implore, as though I
can disconnect one from the other as a perfect stand-alone example of my
ability – is especially brutal, one that embodies the word dread.

My favorite rejection letter was
an E-mail from another literary agent (do you sense a trend here?). It was 3
words in response to what I thought was a succinct plot summary coupled with a
witty turn of phrase or two and the first three chapters.

The E-mail read: Not for me

No greeting, no signature, not
even a period. She didn’t have time to
close the fucking sentence.

Any
upcoming projects you would like to let us know about?

Beyond conceding that I AM at
work on a new novel, that’s a big sssssssshhhhhh. I can say that it’s about bad
luck, and good -- the paths chosen when fortune smiles on us, the desperate
measures taken when it doesn’t.

Is there an author you would
really like to meet? Where, and what
would you talk about?

I
always cite John Irving. The
World According To Garp opened my eyes to
possibilities in literature that didn’t exist to me prior. His subsequent work
has been just as vital, and his style brings an empathy, clarity and humanity
to the most unrelentingly cruel encounters and unexpected character pivots. I
can only aspire to his literary prowess, and I would probably just weep
copiously or lose control of my bowels in his presence, neither of which would
make a favorable impression.

What
are you reading currently?

I am loving the trashy and salacious Full Service, by Scotty Bowers, the Hollywood hustler
who serviced people like Cary
Grant and procured women for Katherine Hepburn. Whether it is true nor not is inconsequential.
I crave a little dirt to sprinkle over my morning egg, and this tell-all supplied
it.

I push away the toss pillows
plumped horizontally under the duvet to approximate a body alongside my own.

I hate this foam memory mattress.
I wish we’d kept our very first lumpy, concave mattress. Andy’s dent would
still be in it. I could sink into it, let it swallow me up.

I will never again hear him
whisper into my ear, “Sleepy time now.”

I will never again feel his
heartbeat when he wakes from nightmares, holding on to a spindle of our
headboard.

I will never ever again kidnap
the cool part of his pillow. It was just one push/pull in our 23 years of
push/pull continuum. When my own was airless and warm, I would find that
unoccupied part, I would slowly pull the pillow toward me until his shoulders
grazed my breastbone, nestle my head behind his and go to sleep. It didn’t stay
cool for long. I’d restlessly return to my own, or he’d wake enough to take it
back with a grouchy harumph but two, three times a night my right hand, like a
divining rod jerking toward a source of water, would go wandering for fresh,
for safe, for cool. It was like winning a prize. I will miss those two big
heads full of alpha male dreams sharing one pillow.

Now it’s all mine.

I can have as much cool as I
want, can dominate every bit, which is very different.